The local time on October 23, the Democratic presidential candidate Biden in the last round of the presidential debate, said a “dark winter” is coming. The newest addition to the list is the newest one, which is the second highest since the outbreak of the epidemic, and it continues to rise.
The third set of outbreaks in the U.S., the Midwest rural areas have become the new “epicenter,” the already fragile health care system is overwhelmed. Some experts have warned that it will be even more difficult to control the epidemic in rural areas, and that only by respecting science and abandoning political bias can we overcome the difficulties.
Rural America Has Been Hit Hard
A new wave of epidemic outbreaks swept through rural America in the fall and winter. According to the New York Times, the number of confirmed cases per million people in rural areas is significantly higher than in urban areas, twice as high.
Compared to urban areas, rural areas in the United States are sparsely populated, have limited mobility, and were minimally affected by the epidemic before September. This fall and winter, however, rural areas have become the new “epicenter” of the outbreak.
Foster County, North Dakota, an area with a population of about 3,000, had accumulated only three confirmed cases of new crowns before July. As of Oct. 20, however, one in 20 people here had tested positive for a new crown, with half of those cases coming in the last two weeks.
Bismarck, the capital of North Dakota, is already experiencing a health care system emergency, with new coronary patients having to be transferred to neighboring hospitals and even across state lines. As of Oct. 19, there was only one ICU unit left vacant in all of Bismarck’s hospitals. Meanwhile, the close contact tracing program here has been suspended because of the high number of infections.
In Norton County, Kansas, which has the highest number of confirmed cases per million people in the U.S., 62 people were infected in a nursing home, including 10 deaths. The medical center in Kansas City has now had to suspend ambulance dispatches because it no longer has any available beds.
Nine states across the nation now have a confirmed rate of more than 10 percent, with South Dakota, Iowa, Idaho, and Wisconsin having a recent rate of 20 percent.
Medical experts say unprecedented badness is on the horizon and are predicting the number of daily deaths will reach 2,300 next January. That number will be double the current daily high.
Lack of epidemic preparedness, fragile health system to blame
According to experts, there are two main reasons why rural areas of the United States are the “epicenter” of the epidemic.
First, the willingness of people in rural areas to wear masks is very weak. On the one hand, people in rural areas have not experienced a major outbreak of the epidemic before, and are becoming fatigued from fighting the epidemic. It’s not just a matter of time, but it’s also a matter of time before we get to the point where we can’t do anything about it.
Public places in the epidemic-hit Bismarck district are still crowded with people who are not wearing masks. In interviews, locals said that it was a matter of personal choice whether to wear a mask or not. Bismarck’s public health director felt powerless, and even received insulting and threatening emails after she suggested a “mask injunction” for the area.
On the other hand, the outbreak was mostly in the “red zone” of Trump supporters. The New York Times said that Trump still told Americans “don’t be afraid of the new coronavirus” after he was cured of the new crown, which to a large extent misled the people whose awareness of epidemic prevention was already weak and further hindered the scientific fight against the epidemic.
Rural hospitals have been facing the problem of inadequate funding, limited medical staff, poor clinical capacity, and their fragile health care system in the new coronary outbreak is vulnerable. According to NPR, in many rural areas, small hospitals do not have adequate medical equipment and capacity, and have to transfer most of their critically ill patients to the metropolis.
In addition, the population in rural areas is aging and has a higher incidence of chronic diseases than in suburban and urban areas, and is more likely to rapidly develop serious illnesses. This, coupled with the fact that rural populations have difficulty accessing timely treatment, results in relatively high mortality rates.
It is not too late to mend the fold, as there have been successful experiences.
Not every region is in dire straits, however. In the past two months, there have been almost no new cases of new crowns diagnosed in Vermont.
The U.S. media have followed Vermont’s success story and have found differences between here and other regions.
First of all, the Vermont government strictly regulates scientific opinion in order to stop the spread of misinformation. The two major local news media, VTDigger and Seven Days, have both closed the comment sections of their epidemic-related articles and are actively encouraging the public to comply with epidemic prevention regulations.
Vermont, meanwhile, is one of the few areas that has not politicized the epidemic. Although there is almost a consensus within the Republican Party to fight the epidemic negatively, Vermont’s Republican Governor Phil Scott has done the opposite. He has continued to encourage citizens in public to take the new crown epidemic seriously and to be disciplined and adhere to the rules regarding epidemic preparedness. For most of the neo-crowning briefings, he left the lead to the medical experts.
Scott was not the only decision maker able to put aside partisan bias to actively fight the epidemic. In Fargo, North Dakota’s largest city, Mayor Tim Mahoney used his emergency executive powers to issue a “mask mandate. Previously, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum (Doug Burgum) but insisted that the public is not forced to wear masks, and claimed that “small government” is conducive to the prevention and control of the epidemic, which ultimately led to the state in the outbreak of the full fall.
The U.S. media and experts called for the “politicization of the epidemic” is not feasible, government officials must put aside their political bias, respect scientific facts, and actively implement the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) epidemic guidelines, it is possible to reduce unnecessary deaths, through the epidemic of “winter”.
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